Amanda Douglas - The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe - or, There's No Place Like Home

Then two pounds of butter passed through the same process of cheapening. Joe began to lose his temper. Afterward a broom, some tape and cotton, and finally a calico dress.

"Now, here's three dozen eggs for part pay. They're twenty-four cents a dozen."

"Why, that's what we sell them for," said astonished Joe, mentally calculating profit and loss.

"Oh! they've gone up. Hetty Collins was paid twenty-five over to Windsor. I'd gone there myself if I'd had a little more time."

"I wish you had," ejaculated Joe inwardly.

She haggled until she got her price, and the settlement was made.

"She's a regular old screwer," said Joe rather crossly. "I don't believe it was right to let her have those things in that fashion."

"All things work together for good."

"For her good, it seems."

Father Terry went back to his post by the stove. Joe breathed a little thanksgiving that Flossy was not Mrs. Van Wyck's maid-of-all-work.

Joe's next customer was Dave Downs, as the boys called him. He shuffled up to the counter.

"Got any reel good cheese?"

"Yes," said Joe briskly.

"Let's see."

Joe raised the cover. Dave took up the knife, and helped himself to a bountiful slice.

"Got any crackers?"

"Yes," wondering what Dave meant.

"Nice and fresh?"

"I guess so."

"I'll take three or four."

"That will be a penny's worth."

When Dave had the crackers in his hand he said, raising his shaggy brows in a careless manner, —

"Oh! you needn't be so perticelar."

Then he took a seat beside Father Terry, and munched crackers and cheese. "Cool enough," thought Joe.

Old Mrs. Skittles came next. She was very deaf, and talked in a high, shrill key, as if she thought all the world in the same affliction.

She looked at every thing, priced it, beat down a cent or two, and then concluded she'd rather wait until Mr. Terry came in. At last she purchased a penny's worth of snuff, and begged Joe to give her good measure.

After that two customers and the mail. Father Terry bestirred himself, and waited upon a little girl with a jug.

Joe was rather glad to see Mr. Terry enter, for he had an uncomfortable sense of responsibility.

"Trade been pretty good, Joe?" with a smile.

"I've put it all down on the slate, as you told me."

"Hillo! What's this!"

A slow stream of something dark was running over the floor back of the lower counter.

"Oh, molasses!" and with a spring Joe shut off the current, but there was an ominous pool.

"I did not get that: it was" – and Joe turned crimson.

"Father. We never let him go for molasses, vinegar, oil, or burning fluid. He is sure to deluge us. Run round in the kitchen, and get a pail and a mop."

"It's my opinion that this doesn't work together for good," said Joe to himself as he was cleaning up the mess.

"So you had Mrs. Skittles?" exclaimed Mr. Terry with a laugh. "And Mrs. Van Wyck. Why, Joe!"

"She beat down awfully!" said Joe; "and she wanted every thing thrown in. Mr. Terry" —

"She called on father, I'll be bound. But she has taken off all the profits; and then to make you pay twenty-four cents for the eggs."

"I'd just like to have had my own way. If you'll give me leave" —

"You will have to look out a little for father. He's getting old, you know; and these sharp customers are rather too much for him."

"I'll never fall a penny again;" and Joe shook his head defiantly.

"You will learn by degrees. But it is never necessary to indulge such people. There's the dinner-bell."

Dave Downs had finished his crackers and cheese, and now settled himself to a comfortable nap. Joe busied himself by clearing up a little, giving out mail, and once weighing some flour. Then he discovered that he had scattered it over his trousers, and that with the molasses dabs it made a not very delightful mixture. So he took a seat on a barrel-head and began to scrub it off; but he found it something like Aunt Jemima's plaster.

"Run in and get some dinner, Joe," said Mr. Terry after his return to the store.

"But I was going home," replied Joe bashfully.

"Oh! never mind. We will throw in the dinner."

So Joe ran around, but hesitated at the door of Mrs. Terry's clean kitchen. She was motherly and cordial, however, and gave him a bright smile.

"I told Mr. Terry that you might as well come in here for your dinner. It is quite a long run home."

"You are very kind," stammered Joe, feeling that he must say something, in spite of his usual readiness of speech deserting him.

"You ought to have an apron, Joe, or a pair of overalls," she said kindly. "You will find grocery business rather dirty work sometimes."

"And my best clothes!" thought Joe with a sigh.

But the coffee was so delightful, and the cold roast beef tender as a chicken. And Joe began to think it was possible for a few things to work together for good, if they were only the right kind of things.

Altogether he went home at night in very good spirits.

"But my trousers will have to go in the wash-tub, Granny," he exclaimed. "I believe I wasn't cut out for a gentleman, after all."

"O Joe, what a sight! How could you?"

"It was all easy enough. If you'd had molasses to scrub up, and flour to get before it was dry, you would have found the sticking process not at all difficult. And oh! Mrs. Van Wyck came in."

Florence flushed a little at this.

"Yes, wait till I show you." With that, Joe sprang up, and wrapped Granny's old shawl about him, and began in his most comical fashion. In a moment or two the children were in roars of laughter.

"I don't know as it is quite right, Joe dear," interposed Granny mildly, "to make fun of any one."

"My conscience don't trouble me a bit;" for now he was in a high glee. "I owe her a grudge for making me pay twenty-four cents for eggs. And, Granny, when you come to the store, don't beat me down a penny on any thing; nor ask me to throw in a spool of cotton nor a piece of tape, nor squeeze down the measure. I wonder how people can be so mean!"

"Rich people too," added Florence in an injured tone of voice, still thinking of Mrs. Van Wyck's overture.

"There's lots of funny folks in the world," said Joe with a grave air. "But I like Mr. Terry, and I mean to do my very best."

"That's right;" and Granny smiled tenderly over the boy's resolve.

"And I'll put on my old clothes to-morrow. Who knows but I may fall into the mackerel-barrel before to-morrow night?"

Kit laughed at this. "They'll have to fish you out with a harpoon, then."

"Oh! I might swim ashore."

The next day Joe improved rapidly. To be sure, he met with a mishap or two; but Mr. Terry excused him, and only charged him to be more careful in future. And Father Terry administered his unfailing consolation on every occasion.

But on Saturday night Joe came home in triumph.

"There's the beginning of my fortune," he said, displaying his dollar and a half all in hard cash. For that was a long while ago, when the eagle, emblem of freedom, used to perch on silver half-dollars.

"I think I'll go into business," said Hal one evening, as he and Granny and Florence sat together.

They missed Joe so much! He seldom came home until eight o'clock; and there was no one to stir up the children, and keep the house in a racket.

"What?" asked Granny.

"I am trying to decide. I wonder how chickens would do?"

"It takes a good deal to feed 'em," said Granny.

"But they could run about, you know. And buckwheat is such a splendid thing for them. Then we can raise ever so much corn."

"But where would you get your buckwheat?" asked Florence.

"I was thinking. Mr. Peters never does any thing with his lot down here, and the old apple-trees in it are not worth much. If he'd let me have it ploughed up! And then we'd plant all of our ground in corn, except the little garden that we want."